UA EVENT SPOTLIGHTS HIGH-TECH CREATIVITY

BYLINE: Andrew Johnson, The Arizona Republic

The next major product or service to revolutionize the way people live, work or play could be on display Tuesday right in Arizona's backyard.

The Arizona Center for Innovation, a high-tech business incubator housed at the University of Arizona's Science and Technology Park in Tucson, is holding its fourth-annual Innovation Day at UA.

The event, to be held from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the university's Student Union, will showcase technological inventions of the school's faculty and students and will present awards to those inventors whose work has had a significant impact on the school.

"We started this four years ago in an effort to begin to celebrate and highlight the efforts the university was making to (advance) technology commercialization and create a new culture in the university that nurtures innovation," said Bruce Wright, associate vice president for economic development at the University of Arizona and president of the Arizona Center for Innovation.

This is the second year the event has included a showcase of student developments.

Attendees can expect to see everything from an invention that uses GPS technology to deliver location-specific display advertising in taxicabs and tour buses to a sticker that changes colors to indicate when fruit is ripe.

"We're finding the students are a great source of company spinouts and opportunities" for the university, Wright said.

The students taking part in the showcase are participants in the McGuire Center for Entrepreneurship, a program in the university's Eller College of Management.

An event such as Innovation Day is important not just for the university, but for Arizona residents in general because of the potential economic impact faculty and student inventions can have and the solutions they provide, Wright said.

"These technologies in many ways address problems and concerns that people have," he said, "whether it's health care or whether it's better telecommunication."

In addition to an awards ceremony and a technology showcase, the event will include a session about how to fund a new invention and bring it to market.

Reach the reporter at andrew.johnson@arizonarepublic.com or (602)444-8280. Read his entrepreneurs blog at bizblogs.azcentral.com.